Arts of Deception
by green lion
Summary: The thief had changed her black gloves for white ones, but other identities could not be shed so easily. A missing scene from the finale of the episode "Hot Ice." One shot.


**Disclaimer:** Carmen, Zack & co belong to somebody else. I'm just borrowing them for a bit.

**Summary:** The thief had changed her black gloves for white ones, but other identities could not be shed so easily. A missing scene from the finale of the episode "Hot Ice."

**Author's Note:** I have always found the imagery at the end of this episode, where Carmen lays aside her black gloves for white ones, very provocative. It felt like a deliberate choice on the part of the animators, as this is the episode where we first learn that Carmen had once been one of the "good guys." I have wanted to write a fic that played with that imagery for a long time, and this is what I finally came up with.

Title is in reference to a biography of P.T. Barnum.

* * *

Carmen Sandiego stood in the empty dressing room, listening to the muted sounds of crowd and calliope drifting backstage from the circus performance. It was still quiet enough that she could count her own heartbeats, racing in quickstep, cut-time. As she exchanged her hat and trenchcoat for an altogether different genus of costume, Carmen willed her racing heart into tranquil submission. For this particular escape she had chosen a masquerade over her usual soaring vault into thin air. Now was not the time for elaborate gadgets or death-defying acrobatics. All that was required was an artful deception.

The thief neatly tucked her long hair beneath a scrap of nylon that had been fashioned into a makeshift wig-cap. She then dipped a sponge into a canister of something rather unimaginatively titled "Clown White." With painstaking precision, Carmen spread the foundation over her bare skin, from her hairline to the space where her neck met the collar of her costume, until her entire face was covered in a ghostly white mask. Deft hands which could crack a safe with lightning-like speed now applied rouge and mascara with the same alacrity. Carmen knew the clown disguise was an odd choice- the enigmatic glamour of a _maiko_ geisha would have suited her better by far. While layers upon layers of tightly-wrapped silken kimono might have been beautiful, they would only have slowed her down in a footrace against ACME's detectives. Besides, her crimes were her own carefully orchestrated three-ring circus, of which she was ringmaster, illusionist, daredevil, and clown rolled into one. It was fitting in its own way, she thought, adding a bright gold and purple star to the corner of her left eye. For symmetry's sake, Carmen used her brush to apply a trail of blue and silver tears to her right cheek. She appeared a sad clown from one angle and a happy one from the other. That oddly suited her, too.

Carmen set down her makeup tools and placed a curly orange wig upon her head, making sure to adjust its large polka-dotted bow so that it hung comically askew. Once she was satisfied, she tugged on the white gloves that completed her costume. Her vermillion-stained lips gave a slight quirk. The thief had changed her black gloves for white ones, but other identities could not be shed so easily. And some masks could not be removed with warm water and soap at the end of the day.

It had been a very odd caper, one that taken her father down memory lane than she normally preferred to venture. The ACME security system had the truth of it: she had not set foot within the agency since her departure ten years, three months, and seven days before. It was hardly the place she remembered from her days as the agency's star detective. The brick and mortar corridors of her youth and the once state of the art teletype machines and electronic typewriters had all been upgraded to sleek steel and digital precision. Even without her "gift" of enhanced processing speed, the C-5 accomplished in moments the type of trip that would have taken her days on various planes, trains, and automobiles. It made Carmen feel strangely sad for Ivy and Zack. The travel had been part of the adventure, part of the challenge. Sure, it sometimes left you stranded at a bus depot outside La Paz with altitude sickness but that was part of the _game_. The devil…and the fun…was in the details. Carmen shook her head and smiled. She would not like to be a detective in this brave new world of C-5 corridors and digital databases, even if it meant matching wits with a thief as exceptionally gifted as herself.

Carmen went to the closet and neatly hung her red hat and trenchcoat on the rack, carefully tucking her gloves into her deep pockets before carefully closing the door. It was strange to see her costume hanging so limply there, a disembodied shell of the great Carmen Sandiego. The coat and hat were all that she was, all that she had become after leaving ACME. Her thoughts again were drawn back to the break-in at her former employer. It had only taken a few well-placed hacks to convince the agency's security system that she had returned to the fold. The Chief had been willing to kill the proverbial fatted calf for her, welcoming his prodigal daughter back with open arms. A computer system could be tricked, and a disembodied AI's emotions were rendered in zeroes and ones. Carmen knew that if she ever decided to exchange her metaphorical black gloves for white ones—hypothetically of course—the flesh and blood humans of her acquaintance would not be nearly so forgiving. Especially a certain flame-haired detective named Ivy.

Carmen stared at her reflection in the dressing room mirror, trying to distinguish the woman behind the mask. Was she an ethical criminal, a walking oxymoron? A thief who still retained a certain goodness while she committed acts most would consider morally wrong? Or had she been corrupt from the start, a detective who merely hid her criminal nature behind a façade of lawfulness until she had finally succumb to whatever dark desires lurked in her soul? Most times Carmen saw herself as the former. She had a sneaking suspicion Ivy and Zack saw her as the latter.

Inspiration struck Carmen. Impulsively, she picked up a tube of crimson lipstick and wrote a message on the dressing room mirror. Satisfied with her handiwork, she ran off to join the circus.

* * *

Zack opened the door to find the dressing room sorely lacking in elusive criminal masterminds. "She's not in here, either, Ivy," he called to his sister.

Ivy dutifully checked the closet as well, leaving no stone unturned. Carmen Sandiego's clothes were in it, but she herself was not. "Looks like she was here at one point, little bro."

"_Was_ being the operative word," Zack said, dejected. "Face it, we've lost her. Again."

His sister's green eyes scanned the room, sharpening when they alighted on the large vanity mirror. "What's this written here?" She touched the writing with her fingers. "Is this lipstick? Classy, Carmen," the detective remarked while rolling her eyes.

Zack read the thief's message aloud, "No man for any considerable period can wear one face to himself and another to the multitude, without finally getting bewildered as to which may be the true."

"Is it a clue?" Ivy asked, puzzled.

"It's Nathaniel Hawthorne," Zack said.

"Show-off," Ivy teased. "Chief, give us a full info-scan on Nathaniel Hawthorne. If we act quickly, maybe we can catch up with Carmen."

"Whoa, Ivy. This doesn't feel like a clue."

"How do you know?"

Zack shrugged sheepishly. "I just do. I think Carmen's done. You know how she is about showmanship. The business with the diamond and the C-5— that was her grand finale. It'd be hard to top that. And the American Renaissance just doesn't make sense as an encore."

Ivy frowned. "Okay,then why the Hawthorne quote?"

Zack stared at the red words drawn upon the mirror. He considered himself a man of science, someone who dealt in facts and figures and precise equations. But the funny feeling he felt right now couldn't be quantified. "I don't know…promise you won't laugh," he began.

"I won't. Scout's honor." Ivy held up her fingers and crossed them over her heart.

"It is a clue, Ivy. But not to any caper. It's about Carmen," he said seriously.

"Carmen left us a clue about herself," Ivy said, her voice flat as a pancake.

Zack joked, "Biggest mystery of them all, right?" Ivy pursed her lips. "Oh, don't tell me you're not curious about what makes her tick."

"One face to herself and another to the multitude? I'm not sure even Carmen Sandiego knows what makes herself tick these days," his sister replied tartly.

"But then why give ACME the diamond?" he prodded.

"She didn't give us the diamond, Zack. She fashioned it from illegally obtained materials and we repossessed it. We turned her scheme against her," Ivy insisted, visibly growing hotter under the collar with each passing second.

Zack examined the colorful pots of clown paint Carmen had left behind. "But this circus escape is just so random…it's like she knew she was going to end up here. I think it was was her intention all along for us to end up with the diamond…and for ACME's system to get enhanced processing speed. Her caper was just smoke and mirrors, sis. An elaborate slight of hand," Zack finished, pleased with his eloquent deduction.

Ivy still wasn't buying it. "She always has an escape planned, little bro. How is this time different than any other? And why would she want to make us better at our jobs?"

Zack eyed the crimson and gold fedora on its hook in the closet and smiled. "For the challenge, of course."

"Well, I don't care if she planned it or not. I intend to use every mega-giga-whatever she gave us to bring her down," his sister told him in a huff. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I think I'd like to interview the circus crew to see if they have any leads on Carmen."

Zack sank into the chair before the dressing room mirror and read Carmen's "clue" again. He picked up a tissue to wipe away the lipstick, but hesitated. The words struck a chord with him, he just couldn't bring himself to wipe them away.

Perhaps Ivy only saw one side of the master thief. But, he at least, was beginning to see another.


End file.
